(UPDATE: here is the link to the product I mentioned if you are looking to avoid it! Hamper Thanks Linda for reminding me to provide a link!)

Settling on the final touches in the baby’s room, I realized I wanted a hamper just for baby’s tiny clothes. I really didn’t want them all mixed up with our big clothes, jeans and my husbands home repair outfits, so I set out to get one. I ended up at Target (where you can pretty much find anything) and found a brown non-baby looking hamper and brought it home. First things first- I ran another errand and when I stepped back into my car I was greeted with a simply awful smell! It was the smell of a new plastic thing. But I had never really had anything new that smelled quite so badly– and strong. So I took it home and figured that my car was small and not ventilated at the time. In the corner of the baby’s room it went. The next day I walked in the baby’s room (as I do so often just to admire all the cute baby things!) and again smelled this most awful smell stinking up my precious one’s space.

What to do?

I knew it was a) because of whatever it was made out of was off-gassing and b) because it was brand new. But still I had never had anything (besides paint fumes) smell so strongly! So I decided it couldn’t be this bad for long, so I put it outside for a couple days to air out. Still- it wasn’t phased! Every time we put it back in the house it reeked. Finally, when I saw this awful thing sitting in my backyard being blown around by the wind, I thought to myself, “What am I doing? I do not have to put up with this!” So I attached the tag back on it and promptly returned it to the store. Finally done with that!

What I ended up doing was sewing a very simple drawstring bag out of fabric that I already had. It was much cuter, softer, washable, cleaner, didn’t cost me a penny, and it didn’t smell like anything! For the life of me, I don’t know why I didn’t think of this idea first, but…lesson learned. I realized your nose is there for a reason. It lets us know to get away from something that smells bad, because if it smells bad it is most likely bad for us. Listen to your nose!

So for everyone wishing to save money, re-purpose materials, and having a cleaner home, here are the very simple instructions for a drawstring bag. Thanks to My Longest Year for posting a simple tutorial for a drawstring bag! (I did change it slightly).

Directions:

1. Place desired amount of fabric (all ironed out and smooth) wrong side up. You can follow the dimensions on the site for a small bag, but I wanted a larger bag for laundry so mine was bigger. (All you really need is a rectangle, but I didn’t even measure mine. I think mine was somewhere around 24″ wide and maybe 44″ tall.)

2. Fold each short side 1/4″ and press then fold again 1″ and press. Stitch along edge.

3. Now fold fabric in half width wise, right sides together and sew along the open edges making sure to stop before you get to the casing you made.

4. Attach a safety pin to the end of a rope or ribbon and feed through entire casing. You should be left with two open ends of the ribbon or rope on one side. Take off the pin and tie the ends together. You’re done!